Architecture of the Book (RBS-Mellon Program)

Date: 27 March 2015
Time: 12:00 p.m.
Location: Beinecke Library, Yale University
Presented by: The Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship of Scholars in Critical Bibliography at Rare Book School and the Yale School of Architecture Ph.D. Dialogue Series

This program consists of two complementary sessions: first, a conversation at the school of architecture that takes seriously the implications of The Architecture of the Book, the title of a retrospective volume recently published by Irma Boom, assessing the engagement of her work with the discipline of architecture and examining its self-conscious relationship to early printed books; and second, a workshop at the Beinecke, during which we look together at a selection of the Beinecke’s early architectural holdings to discuss them not, primarily, as historians, but rather as designers. The sessions pay particular attention to Boom’s resolute commitment to the materiality of the book and to its influence on the form and substance of her design; to the interactions on the printed page between image and text; and to the nature of the presumed relationship between designer and reader. The hope is that this workshop will serve to demonstrate opportunities for a compelling engagement between critical bibliography and the discipline of architecture, suggesting new possibilities for whether, how, and why architecture students engage with these materials.

Sponsored by the Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship of Scholars in Critical Bibliography at Rare Book School and the Yale School of Architecture Ph.D. Dialogue Series.